High School Story and Canter Cove: Short Stories

Christmas Time

Chapter 5

Christmas Time

Christmas was always Nicole Blake's favourite time of year.

But it would be even more special this year because Nicole would be able to share it with her husband, Riley Blake. And she also had her father, so she had her two favourite men in her life to share Christmas with this year.

And this year would be special for many reasons.

Nicole's best friends, Adam Little and Tasha Miller, would be coming down from the city to spend Christmas with their family and friends. Adam and Tasha hadn't been in the city for a long time, but Nicole still missed them a lot, and she couldn't wait to see them again.

Nicole was also glad that she was on her university holidays because it meant she could spend all day every day with Riley. She and Riley hadn't been married for a long time, a few months at the most, and they were still in honeymoon mode. Sometimes Nicole couldn't believe that she was actually married, and it was a great feeling to have a husband.

Nicole never thought that she would be married at the young age of twenty-one, but here she was.

And even though Riley's proposal kind of came out of the blue, Nicole was still glad that he asked her to marry him, and she wouldn't have changed it for the world.

Never.

Now Nicole wished that Riley would hurry up and get home from work.

Sometimes Nicole wished that the local primary school, where Riley worked, would start their school holidays early, and not only five days before Christmas day. It was now about twelve days until Christmas, so Riley still had to go into work, leaving Nicole home alone.

But then again, it wasn't like she was really alone.

She still had her three horses; her chestnut mare named Ruby, her white gelding named Lighting, and her brown thoroughbred named Blue. She also had her golden retriever named Nala who she had recently adopted.

So, she wasn't alone.

Maybe she thought that she was alone because she just wanted Riley with her.

And who wouldn't want to be home with their husband when they were still only newlyweds.

Nicole decided that she would go outside and see her horses for a while. She had nothing better to do until Riley got home, so that was what she would do. And Nicole wished that Riley would want to ride horses more, but ever since he started working at the school, he didn't want to ride as much. It wasn't like he didn't want to ride (he did), but he just found that he didn't have as much time as his wife did.

And riding horses was Nicole's passion, not Riley's, so she was the one in the marriage who always found time to ride.

Today was no different.

Nicole would have liked to ride to the local riding school, Canter Cove Riding Ranch, started and ran by her best friend, Isabella Roberts-Doyle and her boyfriend, Ryan Barnes, but she decided to stay in the paddock because Riley would be home soon, and she wanted to be home when he did.

And riding was always a good time for Nicole to pass the time.

She found that whenever she was on the back of a horse, she always found that she lost all track of time. And that was good when she wanted to pass the time because it worked every time.

And that was great.

Nicole quickly went to saddle Lightning and head out on the trail. She needed a good gallop with Lightning and the fallen logs on her favourite trail formed perfect jumps.